Jonah Ibn Janāḥ

Abū al-Walīd Marwān Jonah Ibn Janāḥ al-Isrā’īlī was a philologist, grammarian, and lexicographer probably born in Córdoba or nearby Lucena. He was educated in Lucena and around 1012 made a name for himself with his Book of Supplement, in which he criticized and “supplemented” the writings of the tenth-century grammarian Judah Ḥayyūj, precipitating a polemic with Ḥayyūj’s students. Ibn Janāḥ’s later Book of Minute Research, which includes both the Book of Variegated Flower Beds and the Book of [Hebrew] Roots, analyzes the Bible using methods similar to those employed in the study of Arabic and the Qur’ān. His works remained influential in the Hebrew translations by Judah Ibn Tibbon (ca. 1120–after 1190).